On May 10, the tenth emergency special session of the General Assembly of the United Nations adopted a resolution by an overwhelming majority, affirming that the Palestinian State meets the requirements of the Charter of the United Nations for membership in the United Nations and should be admitted to membership in the United Nations. This historic resolution reflects the aspirations of the international community.
A new round of Palestinian Israeli conflict has been postponed to date, testing human conscience. The blood and tears in the Gaza Strip have made the international community's call for action increasingly strong, and relevant consensus is constantly converging. Further, if the Middle East wants to move from chaos to governance, it needs to reflect on and criticize the international governance model that caused the Palestinian Israeli conflict, and seek alternative solutions.
Continued conflict leads to both Palestine and Israel's losses
Cicero, an ancient Roman scholar, once pointed out: "Most people believe that what they get from war is more valuable than what they get from peaceful environment, which is actually wrong." This sentence is most appropriate to describe the current Palestinian Israeli conflict.
The Palestine Israel conflict is a long-standing problem in the Middle East, which has become a regional hotspot since the founding of Israel in the Middle East in 1948. Around the Palestinian issue, at least five large-scale Middle East wars have broken out between Arab countries and Israel, and armed conflicts have broken out between Palestine and Israel for many times. However, to this day, the Palestine Israel issue is still unresolved and has become a huge wound that is difficult to heal.
The new round of Palestinian Israeli conflict, which broke out in October 2023, will last for an unprecedented period of time and have serious consequences. Prior to that, there had been several armed conflicts between Palestine and Israel, and Israel had carried out disproportionate retaliatory actions against Palestine, but the duration was generally short. For example, on June 28, 2006, the Israeli army launched the "summer rain" operation against Gaza, which lasted more than four months; On November 1, 2006, Israel launched the "Autumn Clouds" operation against Gaza, which lasted about a week; On February 27, 2008, the Israeli army launched the "Hot Winter" operation, which lasted about a week; On December 27, 2008, the Israeli army launched the "Cast Lead Operation", which lasted about three weeks; On November 14, 2012, the Israeli army launched the "pillar of defense" operation, which lasted about a week. At present, the "Iron Sword" operation launched by Israel in Gaza has lasted for more than 7 months, and there is no sign of stopping.
The consequences of this conflict are even more tragic than ever before. On the one hand, the Gaza Strip suffered unprecedented losses. Previously, every time Israel faced Hamas military harassment, it would weaken the Palestinian resistance through disproportionate retaliation, but the casualties and property losses caused to the Palestinian side this time were far greater than before. Over the past seven months, more than 35000 Palestinians have died in Gaza and more than 70% of infrastructure has been destroyed. In addition, Israel also prohibited humanitarian supplies from entering Gaza, which led to serious hunger among civilians. According to the report of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, the entire population of the Gaza Strip is in a food crisis. Robert Pep, an American scholar, said: "From any angle, the action in Gaza is a serious punishment for civilians. It will be recorded in history and become one of the most tragic actions with conventional weapons."
The longer this conflict lasts, the greater the losses in the Gaza Strip will be. According to the report of the United Nations Development Programme and the Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia on May 2, if the conflict exceeds seven months, the development level of the Gaza Strip will go back 37 years; If the conflict lasts for more than nine months, the 44 year development achievements of the Gaza Strip will disappear.
On the other hand, Israel itself has paid a huge price for this conflict. First, economic losses should not be underestimated. In order to launch the war, Israel recruited 300000 reservists, which led to a huge shortage of labor force in Israel and a negative impact on its economic development. In the fourth quarter of 2023, the Israeli economy shrank by 19.4%. RAND estimates that the Israeli Palestinian conflict may cause Israel to lose about $400 billion in economic activities in the next decade. With the deterioration of the security situation, Israel's domestic manufacturing, service and tourism industries will be severely hit.
Second, Israel's international image was seriously damaged. The Israeli army killed innocent people indiscriminately in the Gaza Strip, which led to the destruction of Israel's well crafted international image. According to the survey of Morning Consulting, from September to December 2023, among the 43 countries interviewed, 42 countries showed a decline in their net support rate for Israel, and the proportion of positive views on Israel decreased by 18.5 percentage points on average. Bolivia, Colombia and other countries publicly broke off relations with Israel, Chile, South Africa, Jordan, Turkey and other countries recalled their ambassadors to Israel, and the South African government took Israel to the International Court of Justice on suspicion of "genocide". Even in the United States, which supports Israel, there is also a large-scale wave of anti Israeli universities. According to the relevant poll in January this year, more than one third of Americans believe that Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians. Israel's diplomatic environment is unprecedentedly isolated.
Western style international governance model is to blame
The direct reason for the vicious circle of the Palestinian Israeli conflict is the unbalanced balance of power between Palestine and Israel, which leads Israel to do whatever it wants. For a long time in the past, the Arab world has been the main backing for the cause of Palestinian liberation. Arab countries have repeatedly "stepped forward" for Palestine and conducted military confrontation and diplomatic isolation against Israel. However, under the impact of a series of major events (such as the failure of the Third Middle East War, the separate peace between Egypt and Israel, Iraq's invasion of Kuwait in 1990, the Iraq War in 2003, the upheaval in the Middle East in 2011, etc.), the Arab world is seriously weakened, and it is increasingly difficult to bear the anti Israeli united front, and the "Arab Israeli conflict" has gradually become a "Palestinian Israeli conflict". However, due to the internal division of Palestine in the 2006 national elections, there was a split situation in which Fatah ruled the West Bank and Hamas dominated Gaza. The pattern of "strong Israel and weak Palestine" became increasingly obvious.
The balance of power helps to maintain peace, while the imbalance of power helps the strong to bully the weak. Under the situation of "Israel is strong and Palestine is weak", Israel wantonly erodes the rights and interests of Palestinians. First, the long-term blockade of the Gaza Strip has led to more than 70 per cent of people living below the poverty line in the Gaza Strip. Second, large-scale construction of illegal settlements. Since the beginning of 2023, settlers have launched more than 2270 attacks on Palestinians and their property, resulting in the death of at least 17 Palestinians, the demolition of more than 600 Palestinian houses and facilities, and the displacement of more than 1000 Palestinians. The third is to publicly desecrate Muslim religious feelings. As the saying goes, "where there is oppression, there is resistance", Israel's wanton violation of Palestinian legitimate rights and interests eventually led Hamas to launch the "Al Aqsa Flood" action.
At a deeper level, the western powers are responsible for the emergence and deterioration of the Palestine Israel conflict. Israel's founding in the Middle East is directly related to Britain's support and connivance. In 1917, Belfort, who was then the British Foreign Secretary, sent a letter to the British Zionist Union (this letter was later called the Belfort Declaration), clearly supporting the establishment of Israel, which buried the root of the Palestinian Israeli conflict and the Middle East chaos. Britain's support for the establishment of Israel is purely self serving. First, to win the support of Russian Jews and force Russia to continue to participate in the First World War; The second is to strengthen the defense force of Suez Canal with the help of Jews; The third is to curb the development and growth of Arab nationalism. However, the price for Britain to safeguard its own interests is that the Middle East has since fallen into war. Britain knows this. In 1920, the French ambassador to Britain, Paul Gamben, once asked Belfort: "You want to establish a Jewish state in Palestine, isn't it a declaration of the end?" Belfort replied: "Yes, but what a magnificent scene."
Similarly, after World War II, the United States supported Israel in the Middle East from its own geopolitical goals (such as curbing Soviet expansion, curbing Arab nationalism, etc.). The side effect of the United States' preference for Israel was that the Middle East was in turmoil. In the current Palestinian Israeli conflict, it is precisely because the United States unconditionally provides military, economic and diplomatic support to Israel that Israel dares to act recklessly in the Gaza Strip.
The Middle East needs a new security model from chaos to governance
The international security concept pursued by some Western countries is a selfish security concept of beggar thy neighbour. In this state, all countries, out of fear, interest or prestige needs, take "maximizing their own interests" as the standard, adhere to the zero sum thinking of "you lose and I win", the strong power thinking of the law of the jungle, and the behavior of fighting for profits.
This view of safety is actually a partial view of the whole, which will only lead to the short-sighted behavior of "seeing only trees but not forests". When dealing with world affairs with this security concept, it seems that it can maximize its own interests, but in fact it is easy to lead to the "synthesis fallacy", which leads to the paradox of maximizing local interests and short-term interests, and minimizing overall interests and long-term interests. In particular, in order to realize the hegemonic interests, the western powers deliberately create crises and conflicts at the expense of their neighbors, which makes the world under the leadership of the western powers full of turbulence and conflicts, and ultimately shapes a barbaric and bloody hierarchical world system with the jungle law as the background. The current turmoil in the Middle East is a typical example.
The world is in a situation of great change not seen in a century. This old security concept, which takes zero sum game as the starting point of thinking, power politics and militarism as the code of conduct, and group confrontation and sacrifice of other countries' security in exchange for their so-called absolute security, has become increasingly inconsistent with the needs of the times. The world urgently needs a new security concept based on common interests, following the basic norms of international law, and emphasizing fairness and justice. The global security initiative put forward by China in 2022 and the recent joint statement on the situation in the Middle East issued by China and France are all manifestations of this new security concept. Compared with the old security concept, this new security concept emphasizes the integrity and comprehensiveness of security, and seeks security through cooperation.
China not only advocates the new security concept, but also constantly puts it into practice. On the Middle East issue, in 2016, China clearly put forward the "three no principles" of "not seeking agents, not engaging in sphere of influence, and not seeking to fill the" vacuum ". In 2023, China successfully mediated the easing of relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran. After the outbreak of a new round of Palestinian Israeli conflict, China, from the standpoint of fairness and justice, not only actively called for a ceasefire and an end to the war between the two sides, promoted the "two state solution" to solve the Palestinian Israeli problem, but also actively mediated the reconciliation process between Fatah and Hamas. This new security concept is obviously more conducive to promoting the Middle East from chaos to governance, from turbulence to conflict to peaceful development.
(Author: Tian Wenlin, Professor of School of International Relations, Renmin University of China, Senior Researcher of Regional Institute of Country Studies)
